ScienceDaily (Sep. 30, 2011) — A team of Russian veterinary colleagues and health experts from the Wildlife Conservation Society's Bronx Zoo are collaborating to understand how distemper -- a virus afflicting domestic dogs and many wildlife species -- may be a growing threat to Siberian (Amur) tigers.
The team presented its results at the first-ever Russian symposium on wildlife diseases recently held in the Russian Far East city of Ussurisk. The symposium underscores the growing recognition of the importance of the health sciences to successful wildlife conservation efforts.
Working at WCS's Wildlife Health Center at the Bronx Zoo, Russian health experts and WCS pathologists used histology along with PCR and DNA sequencing to confirm and characterize the infection in two wild Siberian tigers from the Russian Far East. This diagnosis provides long-awaited genetic confirmation of the fact that distemper is impacting wild tigers, which WCS and Russian colleagues first documented in 2003.
The collaboration will enable conservationists to formulate health measures to counter this latest threat to the world's largest cat.
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Monday, 3 October 2011
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I think this one is easy to figure out. Amur tigers have a taste for anything that looks like a dog, and they regularly kill hunters' dogs in the taiga. There are very few wolves where there are tigers because the tigers kill them, and the dhole's northernmost range is checked when it hits Amur tiger country.
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